


dusty lips

by emmamere



Series: a gathering of abnormalities (hxh) [5]
Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Angst, Bombing, Character Death, Heavy Angst, I'm Sorry, In the Style of The Book Thief, M/M, Sad, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-10
Updated: 2018-05-10
Packaged: 2019-05-04 18:33:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14599152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmamere/pseuds/emmamere
Summary: And there, on the street of heaven, as Killua slept with the safety of his book, the bombs fell.





	dusty lips

**Author's Note:**

> Killugon + book thief.
> 
> Because the book thief is sad and makes me cry and it should make you cry too.
> 
> Gon has the decency to actually fucking die. What is this madness

He coughs. Blood hits his tongue.

Then, a thud, and a gloved hand reaches out to grasp his forearm. He dazedly accepts the gesture. The book slips between his fingers, slick in confusion.

What is that he smells? Killua chokes on the murky air. Only the clogging ash remains above. Only charred rubble lies beneath his feet. He can’t bring himself to speak; words, in all their glory, have been rendered useless.

He stumbles through the wasted wonderland of Himmel Street, brushes past suits and coats as they busy around. The corners of his vision spill secrets - a pale hand outstretched. A child’s feet, pointed to the sky, with skin the shade of death and eyes the same. 

What in all the world’s hells is this?

Familiar strangers litter the streets. The dull worn of their clothe becomes bright lanterns to adorn the scene. Killua could recount every name, but could they him? Could anyone, really, with his ebony hair swallowed by dust and the brilliant blue of his eyes a shocked gray?

He feels dead. Dead as bombshells. Dead as his neighbors. Dead as his sister. 

He had said - insisted - that the day was cloudy. But no day was cloudy so long as this one existed as reference. The fog terrified. It curled spindly claws around his heart. Processing his blood while he still owned it.

Then, he spoke. His own voice surprised him in its weakness.

“Gon?” Killua whispered. 

His palms hit the thighs. Desperate paranoia throbbed in his chest.

“Please?”

What a strange word. He hadn’t recalled using it before. He had truly fallen from grace, to resort to such a sad phrase.

Killua remembered the night as it leaked into morning. The pen clutched like a lifeline. The pages trickled, fine grains between the constant filter of his mind. They possessed his very being. They held memories so precious they would haunt him until he died. He had poured his soul into the book, allowed the tears to collapse and soak the paper.

What a fool he was, to trust such a thing to an object that would never be recovered.

Ink-black locks sodden with grime and lying flat against his skull. Pajamas of emerald now striped with the swampy beige paint. His eyes, staring straight ahead, corroded and slitted with red but most importantly vacated. The boy’s flesh is more ashen than it has ever been and ever will be.

His pallid face is gripped in shaking hands. Blood had escaped his ears and nose. It welled at the fork of his eyes. 

“Gon?” the question lingered, barely above a strain. Had it not been so grievously dry, bile might’ve risen in his throat. 

Killua bumbles with his thoughts. They chain him in a dumb stupor. They entangle his ankles as he attempts to flee. The child senses the force and can do none to resist it.

He screams.

“GON!”

Hiccups erupt and quake. Incoherent gasps and murmurs corrupt the street of heaven. He fumbles with his best friend, cold and limp in his arms. 

Gon’s eyes are wide and tight. He had been awake, scarcely but surely, as the bombs tore from their shelter and split the mellow wind. He had heard their sharp whistling. He had pleaded for reprieve as they landed dead-center on the street then his house. His home. 

No more.

Killua had felt it, too. He had known when the sturdy bricks of the basement wall crumpled like building blocks. His beloved dictionary desecrated and discombobulated. His books, the beautiful words, torn from his hold in such a way it could be called only evil.

Yet why was one dead while the other alive?

“I-i love you,” the sentence ran from his mouth. It dashed in the fear of not being fast enough. It crawled from his throat almost as easily as it did from his heart.

Something habitual. 'Idiot,' and a bitter laugh. The insult so natural, it was as if it had been born on his tongue.

Killua sobbed. He shook his sweetheart’s plagued shoulders. 

“IDIOT!” 

Images flashed. Intelligent amber and captivating grass-green. A joking request. Yet, serious and solemn. 

‘Kiss me…’

And he did. He latched his lips onto those of the the dead boy’s. The other’s taste was ridden with bomb-hit drought. Gon no longer distinguished sweet. Instead was the tang of silky blood.

He kissed him long and hard, and tried his heartfelt best to feign passion. But there was no flame. He felt none as his mouth roamed. He wondered why...until he faltered, and glanced, looking into the lifeless gold of his partner’s orbs. 

And he cried, because he had sworn never to kiss Gon so long as they both remained alive, a promise he had never truly wished to make; though one that would be forevermore sustained.


End file.
